this dirty old disease
by taleasoldasthyme
Summary: Johanna is so busy watching Peeta get better, she doesn't notice herself getting worse.


Thirteen is quite possibly the worst place to recover from an extended stay in the Capitol, Johanna thinks. It's the same sort of industrial construction, all metal and concrete, bars and grates everywhere. Hell, it's even underground.

And her head doctor wants to know why she doesn't feel safe. Because she hasn't left the fucking Capitol yet, that's why.

Still, she has to admit, Thirteen does have some benefits. Morphling, which she is supplied with in mass quantities, is quickly becoming her best friend.

She spends half her day high off her ass, watching Finnick's propos on repeat, and the other half watching Peeta through a one-way mirror. This is nearly the exact inverse of what happened in the Capitol. There, she could talk to him but not see him; here, she can see him but not talk to him.

Johanna wonders if he knows she is there. There were lots of one-way mirrors in the interrogation room, and she could always tell when someone was on the other side. She can't decide if her presence would be a comfort or a burden to him, so she stops trying to tap on the glass when the supervising nurse leaves the room.

He doesn't do much, mostly just lies in bed and sketches with the dull pencil a tiny red-headed nurse brings him every morning and takes away every night. They don't like to waste anything in Thirteen, even paper, so he's always erasing old drawings and putting new ones on top of them.

It doesn't work very well, and she can still kind of see the half-erased lines. If she were the metaphor-making type, she'd say something about his scars or his past, but she's not, so she doesn't.

/

It really pisses her off when they chain him up, handcuffing him to his bed. It shouldn't, she knows it's for his own safety, but it does. He spent _months_ chained up for these people, and now they're locking him up because they're afraid he'll punch them or something? They should be happy to take a punch from him. He's a fucking _hero._

Ever since her first Games, Johanna's had problems falling asleep, but here in the hospital it's nearly impossible. The whirling of the medical equipment and the murmur of the nurses she can deal with; it's the clanging of Peeta's chains being yanked against his bedpost that really bothers her.

He's a fitful sleeper. She can tell, because every time he jolts in his sleep he sets off a metallic ringing that echoes through the ward. Finally, she can't take it anymore, getting out of bed and padding across the cold cement floor.

Their rooms are adjoined, because of-fucking-course they are; why should this be any different than the Captiol?

He's grimacing in his sleep, straining against the handcuffs. He'd been doing good lately, really good, but after the incident at lunch today, the doctors decided it was better safe than sorry.

In the back of her mind, she feels guilty for eating the rest of his food, but that always turns into her feeling guilty for not getting him on the damn hovercraft back in the arena, so she tries to suppress those thoughts.

The keys hang on a little hook by the door, and Johanna imagines it must be torture to stare at them every day, taunting him with the freedom he can't have. She unlatches them quickly, rubbing the bright red welts where the metal bit into his flesh.

"Johanna?" he asks, slowly coming to. She shushes him, pulling her hand away from his as fast as she can.

"Yeah, it's me. Go back to sleep," and he does, turning over and facing away from her. She allows herself to watch him for the count of ten, and then forces herself back into her room.

/

The wedding cake Peeta bakes for Finnick and Annie is gorgeous, and Johanna feels like telling him this, so she sneaks away from the reception. He's in one of the kitchens, washing the last of the dirty dishes. She stands next to him for a moment, leaning back against the counter and watching him scrub, elbows-deep in soapy dishwater.

"You going to make a cake that pretty when we get married, Breadboy?" she asks him, offering the most gentle smirk she can manage. Peeta freezes, lifting his hands out of the water and wiping the suds off his shirt. He turns to her, looking guilty, like maybe he forgot something important. He's been doing that a lot lately.

"We're not getting married, Johanna," he tells her, but it comes out sounding like a question.

"You sure?" she prods, but she's starting to get that nauseous feeling in her stomach, the one she gets when she realizes too late that she's said the wrong thing.

"I am sure, Johanna. I am engaged," it sounds formal and forced, and Peeta keeps repeating her name, like maybe he needs to be reminded who he's talking to.

"Still?" By now she knows she's gone to far, but can't stop herself. She's never been good at self control. His eyes flash, and Johanna's certain he's about to have an episode, lung forward and wrap his still-soapy hands around her throat. She'd let him, because this, among other things, is her own damn fault, and she deserves whatever she has coming to her. But he doesn't lunge forward. He just turns back to the sink and starts washing dishes again.

"No, not anymore," he answers, finally, and it comes out sounding so defeated that she wants to curl up in a ball and die. It's all she can do to echo him back pathetically.

"No, not anymore," Johanna says, before heading back to her compartment, where she will take a scalding-hot shower and collapse on her bed, fighting off nightmares for the rest of the night.

/

Peeta's screams echo off the cement walls until they surround Johanna completely, smother her like a thick, woolen blanket. He's shouting for Katniss; he always shouts for Katniss at first, before he descends in to guttural shrieks of pain. He's not calling out for her, not really; she's just his default thing to worry about. He does call out for Johanna occasionally, and means it. It's an accusation, a _help me you're right there why won't you help me you monster._

Suddenly, it's silent. It doesn't usually end this abruptly, and Johanna panics. She drags herself over to the wall between their cells, presses her ear to it. All she hears is silence, not even a low moan of pain. In all her experience, silence means only one thing: death.

"Peeta!" she screams, pounding the wall with her fists, "Peeta! PEETA!"

Johanna wakes with a start, still shouting Peeta's name and pounding against her headboard. It takes her a moment to realize where she is, but even when she does, her heart is still racing.

Weakly, she swings her legs over the side of the bed and stands up. Her knees immediately give out, and it takes her a moment to push herself up from the ground. On shaky legs, she pushes herself down the hallway, down the stairs, and to the telephone.

"Hello," she hears Katniss bark out, surly and half-asleep, "Hello? Who is this?"

Johanna hears Katniss go on about it being the middle of the night, and what could someone possibly want in the middle of the night, and suddenly she's terribly embarrassed. Peeta's fine. Of course he's fine. He's safe, he's in his home, and he's got Katniss to protect him, and Haymitch, and practically all of Panem. He doesn't need an unhinged ex-killer to take care of him.

She hangs up the phone just as Katniss starts cursing at the mysterious caller and leans back against the wall, sliding down it until she hits the floor, where she stays for the rest of the night, drifting in and out of consciousness.

/

Katniss' pregnancy is hard on her, but it's even harder on Peeta. He's back to having episodes several times a week, and Johanna feels guilty for absolutely no reason.

She's drunk most of the time nowadays, though the memories of withdrawal have kept her from turning back to morphling, thankfully. Annie doesn't need her very much anymore, and neither does her son, who's stopped looking at Johanna like she's a hero the way he used to. Which, good, she never deserved his worship in the first place, but still, it stings.

She's living in Seven, mostly, with a still in the forest behind her house that takes up most of her time. The alcohol it produces is disgusting but potent, and it's good currency when she deals with Haymitch.

She keeps him supplied and, in exchange, he calls her every morning to give her updates on the baby. She makes him promise not to tell them, threatens to let Effie know he's fallen off the wagon.

Peeta calls a lot, and sometimes even Katniss, but she never answers. She's ashamed, embarrassed, afraid they can hear the liquor on her breath. It's irrational, but she's an irrational person, and so finally they stop trying.

Except for one night, Peeta calls again, and Johanna's too drunk to remember not to pick up the phone. He's screaming into her ear, telling her that Katniss is going into labor and could she please catch the next train because he really wants her to be there.

She is still sober enough to remember not to talk, not to let him know what a mess she is. He doesn't want her around his baby, not really, so she hangs up the telephone.

That night, she gets drunker than she's ever been, falls down the stairs, steps on a broken bottle, and does not see Peeta Mellark become a father.

/

"Johanna?" Peeta calls, and his voice is so weak that, for a moment, she thinks it's Annie. Then she realizes that no, Annie was moved to a different part of the prison last week after Johanna told the guards for the thousandth time that she didn't know anything, and so leave her the fuck alone and focus their attentions on someone who actually has rebel information.

"Yeah?" she calls back, her voice rough. She hasn't had anything to drink in ages, and she thinks this is their newest idea. Doesn't matter, she can outlast them.

"Are we going to survive?" If she had any water left in her body, she would burst into tears at the question, but she's glad she doesn't. Tears are for the weak.

"You are," she croaks, and then she passes out.


End file.
